My life is over.
I say as much to Mom and Dad. "You're ruining my life!"
It's the summer of 1971. I've just finished my sophomore year at Bishop Machebeuf High School, and Joe will be a freshman in the fall. We've gone all the way through school with the same friends and teachers, and I am beyond excited to be an upperclassman.
Then Dad tells us his company, Roberts Dairy, has transferred him. We're moving - not just to another house but to another state. Away from our beloved Eudora Street. Away from our school and our big family of aunts and uncles and cousins and second cousins.
I cry for days.
Dad says we won't move until September. "Time enough to fix this old house and get it ready to sell," he informs us soberly.
Mom is as heartbroken as we are but tries to bolster us with false bravado. "It might be the best thing!"
She doesn't fool any of us. Mom's just given birth to her tenth baby, Jeffrey Joseph. We are five Mary's and five Joseph's now, and Mom wants her last baby to grow up on Eudora Street just like the rest of us. She wants to make dinner in the evenings while Carry and Tommy sit in the window between the kitchen and the breakfast room to keep her company. She wants all our stockings to hang together over the same mantle every Christmas. She wants us home.
We never appreciate our old neighborhood as much as we do now. This last summer on Eudora Street, I attach a memory with everything I see. I remember the clubhouse in the garage, the bedroom closet where Duchess gives birth to a litter of puppies. At Mass one Sunday, I remember the day Joe, Mick and I hide behind the stone pillar by the church steps to spy on Rick and Debbie.
Rick and Debbie are eight and six years old. On a breathless day in June, when we're all dying to go for a swim, I tell our gullible little brother and sister that the nuns frolic in their own private pool in the backyard of the convent. Joe and Mick play right along.
"They take off everything and jump right in. It's nice for them," Mick adds thoughtfully.
Joe and I nearly lose it. The thought of our good Sisters shedding long black habits and veils to leap into a pool is almost too much. We convince Rick and Debbie that the nuns are only too generous and willing to share their pool with small children one afternoon a week, and glory to God, this is the very afternoon. If Rick and Debbie walk the half block to the convent, ring the old-fashioned doorbell that turns like a key, and politely ask permission to swim alongside the nuns, they can enjoy two hours of uninterrupted swim time.
Delightedly, we witness the entire exchange from front row seats behind the church pillar. When Rick and Debbie, hopping up and down in their swim suits, ask a stern but bewildered Sister Rose Edward to swim with her in her backyard pool, Joe and Mick and I laugh so hard we roll down the stairs in a gasping heap. Rick and Debbie storm furiously past us on their humiliating journey home.
"Dummy Stupid Brats!" Debbie hisses. It's the very worst thing she can think to say.
But now I sigh. No more practical jokes to pull on Eudora Street.
Just three blocks down Montview Boulevard is Aunt Margie and Uncle Jack's house where we spend every Christmas Eve and Easter. Our second cousins, the Ryans and Tighes and Sperros, are like brothers and sisters. And another six blocks after that is our beloved City Park. In the winters, when we're little, Dad hurls us in our saucer sleds down the big hill in front of the Museum of Natural History. We ice skate on the big frozen lake in winter and paddle boat with our Starbuck cousins on warm July afternoons. One Independence Day, our four-year-old sister Carry steps right into the lake and disappears. My cousin David and I immediately reach down to frantically search for invisible arms and yank her out. Carry is sputtering and furious.
"My God, my God!" she wails in agony. Already a drama queen, Carry frequently invokes the Lord's name much to Mom's dismay. Nevertheless, it's a close call, and Carry's shrieking irreverence fills us with relief.
All summer, we clean and paint and repair until the shabby house on Eudora Street is pristine and perfect. It hardly seems like the same house.
The summer passes too quickly, though. Moving vans arrive on September 14th. Our friends are already in school, and my brothers and sisters and I feel disconnected and forgotten. Life moves forward without a backward glance at the Brown family. Somehow, we expect a school wide mourning period - maybe flags at half mast.
When all the furniture is packed and gone, we say goodbye to the old house. Every room echoes with emptiness, and we all become emotional. Even Dad ducks his head and impatiently blows his nose.
Our only consolation is that we spend the night with the Starbucks who generously invite us to stay in their huge house before we leave early the next morning. We play tag football in the big front yard with our cousins and almost forget that anything will ever be any different.
Before dawn, however, Dad rouses us. On the morning of September 15th, our last morning in Denver, it snows. We have no time to marvel at softly floating flakes in September, though. Dad wants us on the road. We say our hasty, heartfelt goodbyes to the Starbucks. My cousin Leslie and I hug each other long and hard and promise to write. Then we tumble into the old brown station wagon for the longest road trip we have taken together thus far. Even for an all day trip, Carry and Tommy are forced to sit in the crack.
All the way down Montview Boulevard on our way out of town, we shiver. Our shorts and tee shirts are meant for a warm September day, and all our winter clothes are packed in a moving van. Outside, the world is dark and snowy. Nobody is awake in the whole world, it seems, except us. Our mindless chatter fills the old station wagon. As we approach our neighborhood, however, we lapse into silence. Passing Forest Street, we remember our fallen school mate Joey Campbell. On the other side of Montview, our schools and the church are dark and lonely in the predawn morning. In a few hours the early autumn snow will have disappeared. Kids all over the neighborhood will troop to school. A new morning will come to life under bright sunshine, and school bells will ring in the start of a busy day. But the Browns will be long gone.
Finally, craning our necks to stare down a dark Eudora Street, we send silent goodbyes to our beloved old house. To our sweet Duchess buried forever in the good earth of the backyard filled so recently with our noise and games. To all our neighbors and friends sleeping peacefully in their warm beds. To the best neighborhood ten kids could ever grow up in.
Nobody says anything for a long time. When we are just past City Park and on our way out of town, Tommy breaks the silence.
"Guess I have to poop."
We laugh in a kind of relief. Whatever happens next, we're together. And just like that, we're talking and shoving and joking, grateful for each other.
In the gray light of a rising sun, we head east on Interstate 76 to a place we've never even seen much less heard of - to an exotic, foreign, frighteningly unfamiliar place.
To Grand Island, Nebraska.
I say as much to Mom and Dad. "You're ruining my life!"
It's the summer of 1971. I've just finished my sophomore year at Bishop Machebeuf High School, and Joe will be a freshman in the fall. We've gone all the way through school with the same friends and teachers, and I am beyond excited to be an upperclassman.
 |
| Tommy and Carry in the kitchen window at Eudora. |
I cry for days.
Dad says we won't move until September. "Time enough to fix this old house and get it ready to sell," he informs us soberly.
Mom is as heartbroken as we are but tries to bolster us with false bravado. "It might be the best thing!"
She doesn't fool any of us. Mom's just given birth to her tenth baby, Jeffrey Joseph. We are five Mary's and five Joseph's now, and Mom wants her last baby to grow up on Eudora Street just like the rest of us. She wants to make dinner in the evenings while Carry and Tommy sit in the window between the kitchen and the breakfast room to keep her company. She wants all our stockings to hang together over the same mantle every Christmas. She wants us home.
 |
| A typical Christmas morning on Eudora |
Rick and Debbie are eight and six years old. On a breathless day in June, when we're all dying to go for a swim, I tell our gullible little brother and sister that the nuns frolic in their own private pool in the backyard of the convent. Joe and Mick play right along.
"They take off everything and jump right in. It's nice for them," Mick adds thoughtfully.
Joe and I nearly lose it. The thought of our good Sisters shedding long black habits and veils to leap into a pool is almost too much. We convince Rick and Debbie that the nuns are only too generous and willing to share their pool with small children one afternoon a week, and glory to God, this is the very afternoon. If Rick and Debbie walk the half block to the convent, ring the old-fashioned doorbell that turns like a key, and politely ask permission to swim alongside the nuns, they can enjoy two hours of uninterrupted swim time.
Delightedly, we witness the entire exchange from front row seats behind the church pillar. When Rick and Debbie, hopping up and down in their swim suits, ask a stern but bewildered Sister Rose Edward to swim with her in her backyard pool, Joe and Mick and I laugh so hard we roll down the stairs in a gasping heap. Rick and Debbie storm furiously past us on their humiliating journey home.
"Dummy Stupid Brats!" Debbie hisses. It's the very worst thing she can think to say.
But now I sigh. No more practical jokes to pull on Eudora Street.
 |
| Easter at Aunt Margie and Uncle Jack's |
Just three blocks down Montview Boulevard is Aunt Margie and Uncle Jack's house where we spend every Christmas Eve and Easter. Our second cousins, the Ryans and Tighes and Sperros, are like brothers and sisters. And another six blocks after that is our beloved City Park. In the winters, when we're little, Dad hurls us in our saucer sleds down the big hill in front of the Museum of Natural History. We ice skate on the big frozen lake in winter and paddle boat with our Starbuck cousins on warm July afternoons. One Independence Day, our four-year-old sister Carry steps right into the lake and disappears. My cousin David and I immediately reach down to frantically search for invisible arms and yank her out. Carry is sputtering and furious.
"My God, my God!" she wails in agony. Already a drama queen, Carry frequently invokes the Lord's name much to Mom's dismay. Nevertheless, it's a close call, and Carry's shrieking irreverence fills us with relief.
 |
| On Eudora Street with Terri and the Starbuck cousins - Sean, Matt, Les and Joel. |
The summer passes too quickly, though. Moving vans arrive on September 14th. Our friends are already in school, and my brothers and sisters and I feel disconnected and forgotten. Life moves forward without a backward glance at the Brown family. Somehow, we expect a school wide mourning period - maybe flags at half mast.
When all the furniture is packed and gone, we say goodbye to the old house. Every room echoes with emptiness, and we all become emotional. Even Dad ducks his head and impatiently blows his nose.
Our only consolation is that we spend the night with the Starbucks who generously invite us to stay in their huge house before we leave early the next morning. We play tag football in the big front yard with our cousins and almost forget that anything will ever be any different.
Before dawn, however, Dad rouses us. On the morning of September 15th, our last morning in Denver, it snows. We have no time to marvel at softly floating flakes in September, though. Dad wants us on the road. We say our hasty, heartfelt goodbyes to the Starbucks. My cousin Leslie and I hug each other long and hard and promise to write. Then we tumble into the old brown station wagon for the longest road trip we have taken together thus far. Even for an all day trip, Carry and Tommy are forced to sit in the crack.
All the way down Montview Boulevard on our way out of town, we shiver. Our shorts and tee shirts are meant for a warm September day, and all our winter clothes are packed in a moving van. Outside, the world is dark and snowy. Nobody is awake in the whole world, it seems, except us. Our mindless chatter fills the old station wagon. As we approach our neighborhood, however, we lapse into silence. Passing Forest Street, we remember our fallen school mate Joey Campbell. On the other side of Montview, our schools and the church are dark and lonely in the predawn morning. In a few hours the early autumn snow will have disappeared. Kids all over the neighborhood will troop to school. A new morning will come to life under bright sunshine, and school bells will ring in the start of a busy day. But the Browns will be long gone.
Finally, craning our necks to stare down a dark Eudora Street, we send silent goodbyes to our beloved old house. To our sweet Duchess buried forever in the good earth of the backyard filled so recently with our noise and games. To all our neighbors and friends sleeping peacefully in their warm beds. To the best neighborhood ten kids could ever grow up in.
 |
| 2051 Eudora Street |
Nobody says anything for a long time. When we are just past City Park and on our way out of town, Tommy breaks the silence.
"Guess I have to poop."
We laugh in a kind of relief. Whatever happens next, we're together. And just like that, we're talking and shoving and joking, grateful for each other.
In the gray light of a rising sun, we head east on Interstate 76 to a place we've never even seen much less heard of - to an exotic, foreign, frighteningly unfamiliar place.
To Grand Island, Nebraska.
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